


Blood and Bones

by theironrosebud



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Banter, Doctor/Patient, F/M, First Meetings, Flirting, anemia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-07
Updated: 2020-12-07
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:54:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,897
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27931831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theironrosebud/pseuds/theironrosebud
Summary: In which Doctor McCoy treats a pretty engineer for a blood disorder she’s not supposed to have; Miss Diane Coldwell decides the company in the medbay isn’t so bad.
Relationships: Leonard "Bones" McCoy/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 16





	Blood and Bones

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: mention of needles and blood.

He heard them before he saw them. 

“I am fine. You are overreacting!”

“And you are under reacting!” A scottish accent so thick it sounded less like english with every syllable. “We need a doctor over here.”

Leonard “Bones” McCoy poked his head out of his office doorway, concern and curiosity already pinching between his brows. 

She was a pretty young thing in a red cadet’s uniform, her arm accessorized by Scotty’s tight grip around it. The scotsman in question had hauled her to the medbay personally it seemed, and it was obvious he’d done so more roughly than any other patient had ever been brought into Bones’ domain. 

“Mr. Scott, what’s going on here?” the doctor asked. “We don’t usually see you in this neck of the woods.” He approached the pair carefully. 

“It’s not everyday I have to deal with subordinates so bloody stubborn,” said Scotty, not removing his hand from her arm. 

She shot the engineer an evil glare. The woman was flushed and sweating slightly. She looked thoroughly worn out (that’s the medical term for it, Bones thought sarcastically), but she refused to lean into Scotty or anything else for support. Stubborn. 

“What seems to be the problem?” Bones asked. 

Scotty and the woman responded at the same time. 

“I slipped-” 

“She collapsed!” Scotty looked at her incredulously. “‘Slipped?’”

“Look, doctor, I understand you’re a busy man,” she said, “but I’m fine, really. So if you could just tell him that I’m fine, we’ll be on our way.” 

The medbay was, in fact, not busy at all. And usually Bones was glad for the breather, satisfied that the people on Kirk’s ship were happy and healthy. But he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t bored out of his mind today. She was charming, and if he wasn’t so desperate for something to do, he might have been convinced to let her leave. 

“Now, what’s the rush?” He took her by her other arm and the two men began leading her over to the exam table. “There isn’t any harm in letting me take a look. Right, Mr. Scott?”

“Exactly,” agreed Scotty. “Just let him have a look, lass.”

Now she was glaring dangerously at both of them, somewhat betrayed, but Bones was unbothered-- Kirk spent most of his time as a patient glaring, too; he was used to it. 

“She’s complained of a migraine all day, and I noticed she looked a little sickly, but she insisted it was nothing,” Scotty explained. “Then she just dropped, and when she came to, I brought her here straight away.” 

“Oh, is that all?” Bones asked sarcastically, this time looking at the woman for a response. 

She rolled her eyes. 

Bones retrieved his tricorder. The scan was quick and harmless, but the results it showed made him scrunch his brow. 

“I’m going to take a blood test,” he said. 

“Oh, for the love-- Scotty, I have work to do,” she pleaded. 

“Oh, no, you don’t. Until you get your health sorted, I’m putting you on temporary leave,” her superior said.

“You can’t do that,” she argued. 

“You’re fired, lass.”

Bones looked at Scotty in worry and surprise before he stuck the woman in the arm and withdrew two vials of blood. 

“Ouch-” 

The blood screen was already spitting out results. 

“Low blood pressure, low blood sugar, dehydration, vitamin deficiency, low red blood cell count-” he rattled off. 

“Is that all?” she said, echoing the doctor’s earlier statement. 

“When was the last time you ate or drank?” the doctor asked. 

She grumbled. 

“Does coffee count?” asked Scotty. 

“Miss Diane Coldwell,” he read her name off the blood scanner, “You have anemia.”

The woman on the bed did not look surprised at his matter-of-fact declaration. If Bones didn’t know any better, he’d say she was embarrassed about it. 

Scotty’s face flushed. “Is that bad? It’s bad, isn’t it? Oh, lass,” he lamented. 

Bones tried not to smile widely at Mr. Scott’s dramatics. “Actually, it’s an easy fix,” he said to Scotty. “I’m going to get you set up with an IV,” he said to Diane before disappearing into another part of the med bay. 

When he returned, Scotty was gone, and she’d stopped sending everyone dirty looks. It seems her own fatigue won out and put a pause on the fight between the engineers. She had her head back on the bed, arms folded on her belly, and her ankles were crossed. She laid there in the med-bay like she owned it. It almost made the doctor laugh, how comfortable she looked. 

“See, this isn’t so bad,” he said, approaching. 

Her lashes split open to look at him, then closed. He saw her eyes roll under their closed lids, and he grinned again. 

“Is this going to take very long?” she asked. 

“I’m not sure,” he said. “It’s a good thing you don’t have anywhere else to be today.”

Despite being mad at the mention of her “lost” job, the corner of her mouth quirked up in a playful smirk. 

While Bones prepped the IV bag, she said charmingly, “What is it you’ll be doping me with, Doctor?”

“This is a special cocktail of mine,” he said, almost flirtatiously. “Multivitamin, electrolytes, and good old H2O.” 

She was smiling now. She turned her hand, palm up, so that he could have access to her forearm. He sat beside her and swabbed clean the soft spot in the crook of her elbow. 

“I’m hoping it’ll boost those iron levels and blood sugar so that you don’t black out again.” He gave her a warning look. 

She gazed back at him through thick dark lashes. “You sure know the way to a girl’s heart, doctor.” 

There were goosebumps where his hand had been. 

He laughed, and smoothly pressed the needle into her skin. She hissed. 

“It’s your heart I’m worried about,” Bones said. “Symptoms of anemia are easy to avoid if you take care of yourself. But if you don’t, the condition can be really dangerous.”

Her gaze flicked here and there, and her hand was in a fist. 

He continued, “You don’t want to pass out again, do you?”

“Not unless it means I get to see you,” she quipped. 

The needle was in, and the IV drip was set up to the connecting tubes. A chill passed through her body. 

“I’ll be right back,” Bones said. 

The doctor disappeared again, and this time he had a stack of hot blankets in his hands. By the time Diane was wrapped up in a cocoon of warm fabric, she was nearly asleep. 

Bones’ eyes lingered on her as she snuggled a little deeper. 

“Can I tell you something, Diane?”

“Hm?” 

“I may have put a little sedative in the cocktail.” 

Her lips quirked up again. Her expression was otherwise blissful. 

“You looked like you needed it,” he said.

When Diane woke up, the violent chill was gone, but the blankets had cooled. She felt a little groggy, but not nearly as bad as she felt before she collapsed. She was used to the fatigue, the slight nausea, the dizziness. She’d dealt with it all before, and had learned how to hide it from her superiors. She hadn’t expected to faint and rat herself out. 

The med-bay was dimly lit, simulating night time. The beds around her were empty. The only light came from Doctor McCoy’s office. 

“Hello?” Diane called softly. “Doctor McCoy?” 

She schucked the blankets off, and gave a dismissive look at the medical instruments before carefully taking out the IV needle. The bag was spent. She pressed her thumb over the pin prick, and set her feet on the floor beside her bed. 

Diane poked her head into the medical officer’s office to find the good doctor hunched over his desk. He snored softly. The woman rapped her knuckles on the door. Bones jerked awake. 

Diane hid her smirk behind her hand.

“Miss Coldwell?” His voice was low from sleep and he looked a little grumpy. 

“Sorry to wake you,” Diane said. 

“No, don’t be,” he said, massaging the bridge of his nose. “I shouldn’t have been sleeping on the job.”

He opened his eyes and gave Diane a once over, noticing she was sans IV. “You shouldn’t be up,” he said. 

“Um… I guess not,” she said.

Bones led Diane back to the bed she’d been sitting on, and began disposing of the IV materials. 

“Just for future reference, you should probably wait for me to remove this,” Bones said, holding up the needle. 

“Sorry-” her tone said she wasn’t “-but I don’t like needles.”

He had noticed. Bones shrugged and discarded the biohazard materials. 

“How are you feeling?” he asked her. 

“Much better thanks to you...” the woman replied. 

When he turned around, Diane was sitting on the edge of the bed, her feet dangling. Her hand was still pressed to the pin prick in her elbow. Bones reached out and removed her hand. 

He swabbed and bangaged the spot. “You knew you were anemic, didn’t you?”

Their eyes met. She bit her lip. Bones didn’t remove his hand from the soft skin inside her arm. 

“But it wasn’t in your records.”

“Starfleet wouldn’t let me serve if they knew; they’re picky about that kind of thing,” she said. “Besides, I’ve been taking care of it myself.”

“If by taking care of it you mean not eating, drinking, sleeping, and fainting on the job-” he said sarcastically. 

Her pleading expression dissipated, and she rolled her eyes. “I am very devoted to my work. I don’t always have time to eat or sleep.”

Bones leaned away from the exam table and folded his arms over his chest. There wasn’t a sound in the medbay except for the gentle engine hum beneath their feet. 

“Tell you what...” said the doctor, “I’ll make you a deal. I’ll keep this out of your records, if you make more of an effort with your health.”

Relief overcame her expression, and she sighed. 

“Thank you.”

“Don’t make me regret it,” he said earnestly. “Stay hydrated, eat protein rich foods, get some sleep.”

“And try not to black out,” she added sarcastically. She leaned back on her hands casually. 

“Especially not in front of Mr. Scott,” the doctor replied.

Diane smiled from ear to ear, and Bones felt warmer at the sight. (Fuck it.)

He shrugged casually and said “But...you said it yourself...if you do, you would get to see me again.”

Diane Coldwell smirked. “Are you admitting that you want me back in your medbay?”

“Maybe under different circumstances…” Bones trailed off. 

His voice was suave, charming. But his eyes were questioning, brows scrunched ever so slightly. Testing the waters. 

It was a good thing Diane knew how to swim. 

“If I do, will you make me another cocktail?” she asked. 

The doctor laughed and said, “You don’t need to pass out for me to make you a drink sometime.”

“Promise?”

Her eyebrow was quirked up in a way that was every bit an invitation as it was a challenge. She was just daring him to say no. 

“Promise,” he said. “When are you free?”

Diane gave the question some thought before smirking and saying, “Well, I’m recently unemployed, so I think I’ll have a lot of down time on my hands.”

“We better make the most of it, then.”

**Author's Note:**

> I just love first meetings, don't you?
> 
> In case you couldn't tell, this is literally based on my experience with iron-deficiency. I pass out a lot. Take care of yourselves, kids.


End file.
